Battle of the Blue Bloods: Mrs. Astor’s Park Ave Duplex Goes for More Than Half-Off

It’s difficult to imagine Brooke Astor rifling through the discount bin in white satin gloves. What then would the refined socialite and philanthropist think now that her Park Avenue prize just sold for half-off?

Astor cherished the 15th-floor duplex in one of the city’s most coveted co-ops–but then who wouldn’t love six terraces and five wood-burning fireplaces? Following her death in 2007, the estate, headed by her son, Anthony Marshall, listed the spread for a princely $46 million in May of the following year. The price fell from the sky slowly, and not always gracefully. It was chopped to $34 million in 2009, then to $29 million. Most recently it was asking $24.5 million, barely half the original ask.